Cup of Joe

by Teri Wilson

  Java’s pointy ears pricked and swiveled at the sound of his voice.

  “You know, you’re supposed to have my back. Man’s best friend and all. Sound familiar?”

  Java just stared, his thick, plumed tail sweeping back and forth in a low arc. Joe cupped the dog’s muzzle in the palm of his hand and winked. “It’s OK. I forgive you.”

  His kind words sent Java into a frenzy of delight, his nails clicking on the wooden steps of Goldie’s home. Joe ran his hand over Java’s head and paused, trying to imagine Goldie standing over him while he slept. He wondered what had made her come outside. Had she been surprised to find him there?

  Well, most likely she had. Camping out outside someone’s home wasn’t exactly on the normal end of the behavioral spectrum. In fact, if he took the time to think about it, it was rather stalker-like. So, he chose not to think about it.

  Instead, he tried to conjure an image of his beautiful Goldie, bathed in moonlight, spreading a blanket over him with her delicate ivory hands. His gut clenched at the mental picture. Had her face been awash with tears when she’d been so close to him? Did he miss his chance to comfort her when she needed him the most?

  Blankets and late night visits aside, he still had no idea what was going on behind that closed door. But surely, the afghan was a good sign. If Goldie had been in the same near-catatonic state as yesterday, she couldn’t have made the conscious decision to tuck him in for the night. And he couldn’t help but wonder about the significance of the fact that she’d chosen to cover him, not with just any blanket, but this particular one. Her grandfather’s blanket. Perhaps he was reading too much into it, but for him the gesture carried with it a certain poetic beauty he couldn’t seem to shake.

  Joe sighed, and with great reluctance, whistled to Java and strode away from the porch. He didn’t dare look back, knowing that if he did, he might not be able to resist the urge to run back and beat the door down. It was a fortuitous decision, for halfway down the sidewalk he heard his name.

  “Joe?”

  He stopped. Java plunked into an automatic sit.

  “It is Joe, isn’t it?” A kind woman with a grandmotherly face smiled up at him.

  “Yes.” Joe raked a hand through his unkempt hair, trying to gather his wits about him. “I’m sorry. You startled me.”

  “Yes, it seems I did.” The older woman’s gaze shot to the blanket folded into a tidy square on the threshold and then back to him. “I’m Peggy, Goldie’s next door neighbor.”

  “Yes, of course. We met at the funeral.” Joe was uncomfortably conscious of his wrinkled clothes and the dark shadow that undoubtedly covered his jaw line. Goldie had enough to deal with right now without her neighbors making any inappropriate assumptions.

  “I’m glad I bumped into you, Joe. I wanted to thank you for all the wonderful things you’ve done for Goldie. She thinks the world of you, you know.” Peggy’s face broke into a broad grin.

  The sentiment caught Joe off guard. His chest tightened, and his voice turned gruff. “Hmm, er, thank you. The pleasure is really all mine. I would do anything for her.”

  Peggy’s eyes sparkled behind her glasses. “She’s a special girl.”

  “Very special.” Joe nodded, the tightening his chest becoming almost unbearable.

  “I can see you think so.” Peggy narrowed her gaze, and for a brief moment, Joe felt as if she could see clear into his heart. Then she smiled again, and the eerie mood lifted. “I’ll let you get going. I’m sure you have somewhere to go.”

  “As a matter of fact, I do need to get going.” Joe checked the time on his watch. It was even later than he’d thought. He’d lingered on Goldie’s doorstep as long as he possibly could. “I’ve got to run home and then off to church.”

  “Church? How nice.” Peggy patted him on the arm. “Don’t let this old lady keep you.”

  “It was a pleasure seeing you again.” Before Joe led Java to the car, he had the sudden urge to wrap his arms around her in a big bear hug.

  “Oh.” The move must have caught her off guard because she gave a little start in his embrace.

  Before he let her go, Joe whispered in her ear, “If you see Goldie, tell her…” He paused. What did he want to tell her? It was too much to put into words. He struggled to come up with something, but instead stood there strangely silent.

  Peggy patted him on the back and he released her without finishing his thought.

  “Don’t worry.” She winked. “I’ll tell her you were here.”

  ef

  If Goldie had been fully awake when the knocking on the door started, she would have realized it wasn’t the familiar steady rhythm of Joe’s knock at once. As it happened, she wasn’t fully awake. In fact, she was sound asleep. The kind of perfect, dreamless sleep she hadn’t experienced in a very long time.

  So, when Bliss scurried to the door in a frenzy of barks and spinning circles, Goldie assumed at once that Joe was awake. Awake and waiting for her right on the other side of that door. She bolted upright in bed, pausing only long enough to make sure the healthy, whole feeling from the night before hadn’t somehow slipped away in the night.

  I’m still here. Still here, all in one piece and actually happy. Thank you, Lord.

  The banging on the door resumed.

  “Coming! I’ll be right there.” Goldie tried to sound remotely coherent. Not an easy task with a mouthful of peppermint Scope.

  She sprinted to the door, running a hasty hand through her hair, and scooped up Bliss. She gave the Cavalier a quick kiss on the nose and opened the door, a smile of heavenly anticipation dancing on her lips.

  “Good morning.” The words were out of her mouth, in a breathy whisper, before she realized the person standing on the threshold was not Joe at all.

  “Were you expecting someone else?” Peggy’s eyes danced with humor, and in her arms, she held Grandpa’s afghan, once again folded into a rectangle as if it had never left the foot of the bed.

  Goldie blinked at the afghan as her cheeks burned with tiny invisible flames. “Um, well, no. Of course not. Come on in.” She waved Peggy inside, willing herself not to crane her neck outside in search of Joe.

  “Good grief.” Peggy rolled her eyes as she stepped inside. “Save it, Goldie. I know he was here. The whole neighborhood knows he was here.”

  The flames intensified. “The whole neighborhood?” She gulped.

  Peggy laid the blanket on the back of the sofa and then plucked Bliss from Goldie’s arms. “Of course. You had a man camped out on your front porch. A rather handsome man at that. Did you really think no one would notice?”

  Goldie shrugged her shoulders. “I didn’t know he was there.”

  Peggy’s gaze darted to the afghan.

  “Not the whole time, any way. I found him there asleep in the middle of the night.” Goldie skirted around Peggy and headed to the kitchen to get Bliss her morning biscuit.

  Peggy, naturally, was hot on Goldie’s heels. She stopped when Goldie disappeared inside the pantry in search of dog treats. “So, what exactly…”

  Her voice trailed off, and Goldie immediately popped out of the pantry. It was a rare occasion when Peggy was rendered speechless, so naturally Goldie was curious. She found her older friend frozen in place in the kitchen, a strange look on her face. Then, Peggy’s mouth curved into a sly smile as Goldie followed Peggy’s gaze to the open door of Grandfather’s bedroom. She dropped Bliss to the floor and the spaniel scampered to Goldie for a biscuit.

  “It looks like something big really did happen here last night,” was all Peggy said.

  “Oh, Peggy,” Goldie sighed dreamily. “I finally did it. I talked to God about the whole thing.”

  She launched into a detailed explanation of the entire experience, from the bend of Harold’s pinky finger all the way to discovering Joe on her porch. Peggy stumbled to the sofa, and sat, mesmerized, hanging on her every word until she was finished.

  “I’m so proud of you, dear,” she said wh
en Goldie had revealed everything. “I should have noticed something was different right away. You have a newfound peace about you. You even look different.”

  “I feel alive again.” Goldie shook her head, still in disbelief. “I’m sure there will still be tough times ahead. I miss him. And I will for a long time. But when the bad times come, I won’t wait so long to talk to God about everything. Never again. He’s been here for me the whole time. When I look back over the past few weeks, I can see His grace in everything around me. My friends, my new job.” She paused, the air between them swirling with meaning. “Joe.”

  Peggy reached over and squeezed her hand. “Good for you. I knew you had it in you. And, now that you’ve got things with the Lord all sorted out, it’s time.”

  “Time for what?” Goldie knit her brows. Was there no pleasing this woman? What could she possibly have up her sleeve now?

  Peggy beamed. “To deal with the Joe situation.”

  Goldie gulped. “There’s a situation?”

  Peggy opened her mouth to answer, but Goldie stopped her with an open palm—not only the universal sign for halt, but also the sign for stay, at least in dog training circles. “I think we may need some coffee for this conversation.”

  “Since when do you drink coffee?” Peggy’s tone was full of mock-seriousness.

  Goldie’s heart skipped a beat. “It’s a taste I’ve acquired in recent weeks.”

  It didn’t take long for Goldie to locate her grandfather’s coffee maker and get it going. Once both women were settled on the sofa with steaming mugs of coffee—Goldie’s with generous spoonfuls of cream and sugar—and Bliss was happily chomping on a rawhide chew, she was ready to hear what Peggy had to say. “OK. So there’s a situation? With Joe?”

  Peggy nodded, her eyes ablaze with some untold secret.

  Goldie struggled to sit still. She would have liked to blame the caffeine for her restlessness, but she was sure it had more to do with the knowing look in Peggy’s gaze. “Do you care to elaborate?”

  “Sure.” Peggy took a long, slow sip of coffee. Goldie wanted to scream. The suspense was killing her. Peggy had always been such a dear friend, but right now Goldie felt more like her torture victim. Something about that look in her eyes made Goldie’s stomach churn.

  Then Peggy said something that made the bottom drop right out of it. “He wants to marry you.”

  Goldie choked on her coffee, nearly spewing it all over Peggy, the sofa, everything. And Peggy had the nerve to sit there and laugh. “That’s not something you should joke about, Peggy.”

  “Oh, I’m not joking. I’m dead serious.” There was the look again, this time with a fierce edge of determination, as if she were daring Goldie to disagree with her.

  Despite the voice in her head that told her to calm down and not get ahead of herself, a thrill of delight ran up Goldie’s spine. She shivered, and her heart thumped with alarming speed. “And how would you know something like that?”

  “Easy.” Peggy took another excruciatingly slow sip from her cup. “Your grandfather told me.”

  Goldie wasn’t sure what she expected Peggy to say, but this was far out of the realm of possibilities. Her heart pounded so out of control she was forced to plunk her coffee cup onto the end table. Caffeine suddenly seemed like a very bad idea. “M-my grandfather?”

  “Yes.” Peggy reached over and took Goldie’s trembling hand. “He sat right here on this very couch and said ‘Joe from the coffee shop wants to marry my Goldie.’”

  My Goldie. It sounded exactly like something Grandpa would say. As much as she yearned to believe it, there was no way it was possible. She barely knew Joe back then. Her grandfather must have been confused. He got that way a lot toward the end. Her heart slowed down somewhat, and she asked, “When did he tell you this?”

  “Three days before he died.”

  Goldie took a sharp intake of breath at the word died and silently asked God to give her strength. “Go on.”

  Peggy sighed and rubbed her temples, as if trying to remember everything. “I had come over to bring him a chocolate milkshake. Remember how much he loved those?” Of course Goldie remembered. In those last weeks, he’d consumed little else. Peggy nodded in silent agreement, her expression wistful, and continued. “And while he was drinking it, I asked him about the checkerboard still out on the coffee table. He said Joe had come over, but they never got around to playing. When I asked him why, he said Joe had wanted to talk to him about something. Something very important.”

  Goldie tried with all her might to tamp down the hope stirring in her soul. “Then what happened?”

  “He grinned. A really big happy grin. Now that I think about it, it was probably the last time I ever saw him smile like that.” Peggy dabbed at the corners of her eyes with her napkin. “I asked him why he was so pleased if he’d missed his chance to beat Joe at checkers. And he said, ‘Joe wanted to come over today to make me a promise. He said he didn’t want me to worry about a thing. He wants to watch over Goldie and make sure she’s happy after I’m gone.’”

  Goldie bit her bottom lip to prevent the inevitable flow of tears. Her head was swimming as she recalled Joe’s stubborn persistence in those early days after her Grandpa’s death. All those coffee cups lined up on the steps.

  Peggy spread her napkin back over her lap. Goldie couldn’t understand how Peggy could be so calm when her own skin tingled with the sudden prick of goose bumps. Was this normal for her? Did she go around doing this sort of thing all the time? “I told him that was wonderful and that Joe sounded like a very fine young man. And Bob said, ‘There’s more. He loves her. Can you believe it? Joe from the coffee shop wants to marry my Goldie.’”

  Hearing it for a third time did nothing to lesson the shock. “Are you sure? Absolutely sure that’s what he said?”

  Peggy reached out and cradled Goldie’s cheek in the palm of her hand. “Dear Goldie, is it so difficult to believe? You should have seen Joe this morning. He’s worried sick about you. He loves you. It’s written all over his face.”

  Goldie blinked back her tears. She refused to cry, even tears of joy. She’d done enough crying to last a lifetime. “Do you really think so?”

  “I do.” Peggy nodded solemnly.

  Despite Peggy’s conviction and the growing sense of elation swelling in Goldie’s heart, the smallest hint of doubt flitted into Goldie’s thoughts. “He left this morning without saying goodbye.”

  Peggy waved her hand in the air in a perfect gesture of nonchalance. “He was in a hurry to get to church. But let me tell you, he looked like he was in physical pain tearing himself away from here. I promised him I would tell you he was here.”

  Goldie shot off the sofa in a panic. “Oh my gosh, it’s Sunday!”

  With yesterday nothing but a blur, and last night one of the longest of her life, she’d completely lost track of the days of the week. She’d been planning to attend Joe’s church this morning anyway, but now it seemed much more urgent. She’d run there if she had to.

  “I’ve got to go,” she shouted as she shed her clothing while fleeing to her bedroom. “I need to go to church. And I need to let Joe know I’m OK.”

  Peggy kept her remarkable sense of calm. “Don’t worry about a thing. I’ll clean up. You get going.”

  Goldie threw on a lightweight, pale pink, hand knit sweater and a pair of soft blue jeans, all the while sending up prayers of gratitude that Joe’s church on the beach was laid-back and casual. With a quick glance at the clock, she decided she had enough time to sweep on some mascara, blush and lip gloss. Once she’d wrapped a hot pink scarf around her neck and run a brush through her hair, she was ready to go.

  “Bliss?”

  The spaniel came running at the sound of her name and Goldie snapped the leash in place.

  “You’re taking the dog to church?” Somehow, when Peggy said it, it sounded less like an accusation than it did coming from Eve’s mouth.

  “Yes. Joe suggested it. Sometim
es he brings Java.” Goldie’s gaze swept the kitchen and living room. True to her word, Peggy had straightened up. Everything was neat as a pin.

  “That’s sweet.” Peggy walked beside Goldie down the front sidewalk. “You have a good time at church.”

  “I’m sure we will.” Goldie’s stomach wavered ever so slightly. After last night, what would it be like seeing Joe? After all Peggy had told her? “And Peggy?”

  “Yes, dear?”

  “Thanks so much. For everything. I don’t even know how to thank you…”

  Peggy gave her a solid hug full of meaning, the kind Goldie would have avoided before the Big Conversation. “There is one thing you can do for me.”

  This came as a surprise. Peggy rarely asked anyone for help, but Goldie was happy to do whatever she needed. It was the least she could do. “Really? What?”